Save You A Seat
by BregoBeauty
Summary: Jackson Rippner finally meets Lisa Reisert face to face. What are they each thinking?


**Save You A Seat**

**Disclaimer:** I don't own anything related to _Red Eye_!

**Summary:** Jackson Rippner's finally met his target. He refuses to have feelings for his latest victim, but what does Lisa Reisert think about him?

Getting in line behind her was a piece of cake. She never noticed that he was carefully keeping an eye on her, despite the carefully folded newspaper propped upon his arm. He preferred it that way. Blending in with a crowd was part of his job and a skill that he had perfected over the years.

But how was he to befriend her? It would make his job ten times easier if she trusted him at the beginning. He would keep her guessing about his true intentions until he played the 'daddy' card. Lisa Reisert would not be able to resist him once he explained the situation. She was weak and his for the molding.

Luckily, an irate passenger made his day. When Lisa opened her mouth to speak and was rudely cut off, he was there as "back-up" to save the day. She smiled back him and he was once again reassured that the Keefe assassination would go off just as planned. No, she would not give him any trouble at all…

"_Save you a seat?" he questioned and she seemed flustered._

Jackson Rippner sat alone at the Tex Mex bar. He glanced at his watch and sighed. There was no way in hell that it should take her so long to make a few 'phone calls'. He knew that it had been a lie—he had seen that she was uncomfortable in her brown eyes. But he did not care. Once they were on that plane, Jackson would do what he was best at. Manipulating situations and people.

When she sat down beside her, he pretended to be surprised. Though he'd had a feeling all along that she would not be able to resist having a drink with him before the flight.

"_Oh…hi…" he said with an undeniable smile. A real smile. This job was going to be a piece of cake…_

"_Hi," she replied, nervous and unsure. "Uh, is this seat taken?"_

"_No, it's all yours," Jackson_ _smiled, gesturing to the empty seat on his left._

Lisa sat down, seemingly grateful. This was all too easy. Well, it was about time that he received an easy job. How hard was it to get a young woman to make a phone call to change a hotel room? Surely, Lisa would listen to reason and save her father's life by complying. In his eight weeks of tracking Lisa—never stalking—he had not seen _anything_ that would indicate to him that she was a fighter. She was a workaholic loner with daddy issues.

"_Thanks."_

"_So…ahh…did you get your calls made?" Jackson_ _questioned, reminding her of her excuse. He hated lies, but he would accept that one. No more lies from her though. She had used up her freebie._

_She nodded. "Yep, no more calls."_

That's what _she_ thought. She would be making another phone call before long. Or else…

"_Good. What'll you have?" he asked kindly, still smiling at her._

Not that he did not already know what she would order. But he would play a game with her. Let her think that he did not know her better than she knew herself. Give her an edge.

Let her have at least _one_ happy memory about that night. He would give her that much. He would confuse her with his kindness and let her believe that he was not as bad as he really was. He was far worse than she could ever imagine.

"_Ahh…um…no it's okay," she stammered._

"_If I can guess."_

_Lisa seemed surprised and taken aback. "Okay."_

_Jackson_ _pretended to think long and hard. "I'm feeling vodka. Definitely sweetened…"_

Lisa seemed intrigued. Jackson smiled at her. She was falling into his trap.

"_Um," his crystal blue eyes darted around, feigning insecurity. "A Cosmo."_

Lisa looked at him quizzically and Jackson knew that he had the upper hand. She was falling for him and beginning to like him. He would use it to his advantage later. If he failed, his life was on the line as well. The Russians were very serious about killing Keefe and his family and if they thought that Jackson failed on purpose, or for any reason at all, they would not hesitate to kill the young manager.

"_No, too common," he said, continuing the charade. "Um, a Screwdriver."_

Lisa made a disgusted face. Jackson almost laughed. He wanted to, but he had to remain professional. He had a job to do. Lisa was the key to his success.

"_No, too boring. So that leaves me with the simplicity of the grapefruit…or the complexity of the pineapple…Grapefruit Seabreeze…"_

Jackson carefully watched Lisa's reaction, wondering what she would think of his guess. He secretly wondered if she would try lying to him again.

"_Uh, could I have a Baybreeze?" Lisa asked the bartender._

"_Ahh," Jackson_ _faked disappointment. Well, not really faked. He was disappointed that she had told a bold-faced lie to him._

"_That's an impressive talent though…Very close," Lisa remarked._

She had _no_ idea what talents he possessed. He was extremely talented with a knife—more so than the 'dog' that he had hired to watch her father—though not so good with guns. He could still kill a person in at least a million different ways and not get caught unless he wanted to.

"_Yeah," he played along. "Breaks the ice."_

Lisa laughed. She was relaxing and beginning to feel at ease around him. Boy was she going to be in for a shock when she boarded flight 1019, the red eye to Miami…

* * *

Jackson Rippner seemed like a genuinely nice guy. She had been wary of men ever since the 'incident' two years ago that had left her with a knife-caused scar upon her chest. She had been unsure at first, but she was beginning to trust him.

It was a shame that she would probably never see him again. He would most likely be flying in first-class, judging by his smart suit, not in coach where she was to be seated.

Lisa did a double-take when she reached row 18. Sitting in the aisle seat was a familiar face that she had just convinced herself that she would never see again. Jackson was sitting in the seat beside hers. What luck!

"_Oh…hi…" she said nervously, flustered once more. "Again."_

"_I figured you'd be flying first class," he remarked._

"_Oh no, not me—I'm all coach all the time."_

"_Ah, me too."_

He was so friendly! She could not get over the fact that there were still some decent men left in the world! It did not hurt that he was good-looking too.

Jackson smiled at her, crystal blue eyes lighting up. He seemed as happy as she felt.

"_Yeah. I…think that's my seat," Lisa said, nodding her head towards the vacant seat._

"_What? You're not sitting here," Jackson_ _said quickly, looking at her curiously._

"_Well, I don't know. Does that say '18G'?" Lisa questioned, showing Jackson_ _her boarding pass._

Jackson examined the paper in her outstretched hand.

"_You're kidding…" he started to say. "No, you're not kidding. Uh, you need a bellhop?"_

Jackson stood up from his seat and took her suitcase despite her protests and placed it in the overhead compartment.

That was really gentlemanly of him. Lisa could have done it herself, but she found that she was unable to complain too much. He really did not have to be so kind to her. After all, she was only a stranger.

Lisa backed straight into the low ceiling of the airplane. Her head began to pound.

"_Uhh," she gasped in shock. _

"_You okay?" Jackson_ _questioned, looking her in the eyes._

"_Yeah."_

"_You sure?"_

"_Yeah. I'm not normally such a lightweight. Uh, must be those strong Baybreezes…" Lisa said, rubbing her sore head._

Jackson sat back down in his seat.

"_What are the odds?" he stated as a question._

"_Yeah."_

"_Wait a minute…you're not stalking me—are you?" he questioned, giving her a strange look._

"_No," Lisa shook her head and they both laughed._

He made a few more comments and then they were interrupted by a blonde woman with an exaggerated tan and she was clearing trying her best to look young. Jackson was too kind to refuse he requests for help and he and Lisa shared a few glances and she giggled.

The kind, elderly lady who liked Dr. Phil, passed by after Jackson sat back down again.

"_I'm already in chapter two!" she called joyfully._

_Oh, great!" Lisa replied with a smile and she caught wind of Jackson_'_s confused look._

Lisa quickly explained to him about the book and he nodded. Then his cell phone rang. Jackson rolled his eyes and sighed as he removed it from his belt clip and stared at the screen.

"_Well, you are popular," Lisa teased._

"_I'm sorry. It isn't usually like this," he apologized. And it was true. Usually he did not get a lot of phone calls while on a job. It was distracting and annoying. _

Lisa smiled at him. He was so nice and polite at times! Why couldn't she have met him a long time ago? Maybe he could have restored her faith in the male race much earlier or maybe being with Jackson would have kept her from the incident. But she would never know.

"_Hey, what's up?" Jackson_ _answered his phone. "Yeah…uh that's okay. So it's definitely happening? Uh huh. 5:30? Okay, done deal."_

Jackson hung up his phone and replaced it. Lisa looked up from the Fresh Air magazine that she was reading.

"_Work," he sighed. "For the last time."_

Lisa nodded. She was used to getting phone calls at odd hours because of her job as a hotel manager at the Lux Atlantic. She understood how annoying it could be.

* * *

The plan was on track. Jackson was to get Lisa to make the phone call as soon as they were settled in the air. His personality was about to take a major turn when he got down to business. There was no room in the Russian's dumb plan for error. He could not afford to fail.

He was not going to fail. Jackson Rippner was anything _but_ a failure.

And this would be the last time that he ever received a phone call from his work. After tonight, Jackson Rippner was retired. As long as the phone call was made and Keefe died, he was a free man—not to mention he would be allowed to keep his life.

Lisa Reisert was the only one who stood in his way. She was his pawn and she would what he told her to, or else he would not hesitate to hurt her and her father. He would use whatever means necessary to carry out the plan and stay alive. The name of the game was survival for Jackson and he was playing to win…

And if little Lisa didn't play along…she was as good as dead.

**Author's Notes:**

Yeah, I skipped some lines and little bits and pieces here and there. This ended up being much longer than I had thought. I hope everyone enjoys this one-shot, I wrote it in celebration of the DVD release today!


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